Costlier food items push wholesale inflation up to 5.7% in March

New Delhi, Apr 15 (PTI): Wholesale price inflation rose to a three-month high of 5.7 per cent in March, as prices of food items such as potato, onion and fruits shot up.

Inflation in the food items, based on the wholesale price index (WPI), shot up by 9.9 per cent in March as against 8.12 per cent in the previous month.

The overall WPI inflation had been declining since December and had reached a nine-month low of 4.68 per cent in February.

According to data released by the government Tuesday, the January inflation number has been revised upward to 5.17 per cent as against earlier estimate of 5.05 per cent.

In March, potato prices went up by 27.83 per cent as against 8.36 per cent in the previous month. Inflation in onion was 1.92 in the last month of 2013-14 fiscal compared to contraction in price of the kitchen staple in the previous month.

Overall the inflation in vegetable segment was 8.57 per cent as compared to about four per cent in February. Fruits were costlier by 16.15 per cent in March compared to 9.92 per cent.

The government further said the build up of inflation rate in the 2013-14 financial year was 5.70 compared to a build up rate of 5.65 per cent in the earlier fiscal.

Prices of sugar, pulses, cereals, cement and minerals eased in March compared to the previous month.

Inflation in the fuel and power category (LPG, petrol and diesel) rose to 11.22 per cent versus 8.75 per cent in February.

Later in the day, government is also scheduled to release data for retail inflation calculated on Consumer Price Index (CPI).

In the monetary policy review earlier this month, the Reserve Bank of India had not changed the key interest rate, expecting a rise in inflation.